The trend for apparel and accessories brands to embrace digital has continued to build momentum, with ASICS Corporation confirming it has entered into an agreement to acquire 100% of the shares in FitnessKeeper on 12 February 2016.

Established in 2008, FitnessKeeper is the operator of fitness tracking app Runkeeper, an application that can track and record fitness activities such as running, walking and cycling through GPS on smartphone devices.

Runkeeper is billed as a world-class leader in the fitness tracking app category and has over 33 million registered users in the US and worldwide. It provides users with notifications of running distance and pace during exercise, as well as functions to record, manage and analyze activities that help users visualize and achieve their fitness goals, and ultimately can make sports more fun for users.

The fitness tracking app market is expected to expand with the increased health-awareness from consumers, growth of the smartphone market worldwide and advancement of wearable technologies.

A release from ASICS continued… ‘ASICS reached a decision on this acquisition as we believe that the integration of Runkeeper’s globally recognized brand and worldwide user base with ASICS’ technological competence in manufacturing will lead to continued enhancement of our corporate value.’

The company added that ‘Through this acquisition ASICS will be able to establish a one-to-one marketing channel utilizing user data including fitness information and obtain a digital technology development platform that is led by a management team with extensive experiences in this field.’

With a founding philosophy to contribute to the healthy growth of young people through sport, ASICS Group has upheld its philosophy to ‘provide valuable products and services through sport to all our customers’. The company adds that it has kept its passion for technology and craftsmanship and pursued customers’ needs in order to serve athletes, sports lovers, and people who deeply care about good health worldwide.

With the addition of FitnessKeeper into the ASICS Group, the company expects to further support customers’ fun and healthy experiences and lifestyle through sports by providing new contents and cutting edge services utilizing advanced digital technology. ASICS aims to ‘fully utilize the resources of both ASICS and FitnessKeeper to provide high value added products, services and contents to even more customers.’